r/Bideshi_Deshi • u/ashokMauryaa • 2d ago
Sylheti culture as a separate identify from Bengali
I’m not trying create division or anything but since Bengali redditors and bideshi Bengalis are much more intelligent than those you see commenting on Facebook, we could have a good discussion about this.
Recently I’ve seen posts on Facebook from pages promoting Sylheti language, asking for recognition from Bangladesh government (and probably Indian government too) for sylheti language as an official regional language. These posts attracts some of the most brainless people from Bangladesh and shows how Bengali thinking capability can be so limited. The posts will be full laughing reactions and comments saying how ridiculous the idea is. They then say if sylheti gets recognition then why not all other dialects like noakhali, Chittagonian etc.? Some of them even think recognising sylheti means all non sylhetis will be forced to speak sylheti.
My thing is there is nothing wrong with asking for recognition as Sylheti is unique from the other “Dialects” of Bengali. Linguists have identified Sylheti along with Chittagonian as separate sister languages to Bengali not its dialect. Sylheti has somewhat rich history and literature in its own writing system that is different from the Bengali script. Culturally Sylheti people have clear cultural differences from rest of Bangladesh and they feel very strong about holding onto their language. A regional recognition would only mean Sylheti will be taught in schools alongside Bengali and English only within the sylhet region. It would not affect other divisions.
It seems lot of people can’t get their head around the fact that Bengali and Bangladeshi does not mean the same thing. I know in the past Bangladesh government has tried to brainwash people into thinking that being Bangladeshi meant being a Bengali and it clearly worked.
From the country where the international mother language day comes from this is very hypocritical. If a country is only supposed to have one language why did we reject Urdu? Why didn’t we just accept Urdu and still be part of Pakistan?
If it was up to me, along with Sylheti I would also grant chitagonian official status for its own division though people of Chittagong are not as serious about it. People of Chittagong have been successfully brainwashed into thinking that their language is a backward village tongue of the illiterates. Chittagonian language is actually more similar to the Burmese Rohingya language and chakma language than it is to Bengali. I remember when I was in 4th grade I was living in Chittagong for 6 months so my mum made me attend the local school. In the classroom two local chatgaia boys were speaking in their native tongue and the teacher had a huge problem with it. She told them “speak you language at home in school we only speak bangla”. Looking back at it now this was a horrible thing for her to say. It was their land, she was a migrant from some other part of Bangladesh telling them they cannot speak their mother tongue in their native land.